Horsey
The premise
The equestrian world runs on trust. Trainers trust bloodlines they cannot verify. Buyers trust videos shot on good days. Federations trust spreadsheets that contradict each other. Most people accept this quietly. A few refuse to.
Horsey was born from that refusal — from a stubborn conviction that every horse should carry one record, written once, verified everywhere, and useful for the lifetime of the animal.
The founders
Equals. Opposites. The improbable pair who turned a late-night complaint about show paperwork into a company.
The Architect Behind the Curtain
Computer scientist · Show-jumping data obsessive · Self-taught polymath
On paper, you'd underestimate him — he left university to build scoring software for local shows. He learned by doing, failing, and doing again. It was Marcus who designed the protocol that makes a record belong to the horse rather than the platform.
The Face and the Heart
Former Grand Prix rider · Operations & growth
She did what most people only romanticize: she walked away from a sponsored career to bet on an idea. Elin is the voice of Horsey — the warmth, the hustle, and the relentless human energy that turns a quiet protocol into a conversation a stranger will answer.
Marcus Riedel and Elin Lindqvist at the yard where the first record was written.
The beginning
It began in a stable canteen, after a show where two horses had been entered under the same misspelled name. Marcus and Elin, both there by accident, complained about the same thing at the same table.
It should have been the start of something. Instead it was three years of drift — Elin on the circuit, Marcus building scoring tools for anyone who would pay him.
Marcus landed a federation contract he couldn't finish alone and brought Elin in. The work stalled. But in its wreckage, two people recognised a complementary brilliance. The project died; the partnership didn't.
From 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. — a single meeting — they hammered out what Horsey was. By that evening, Marcus had sketched the protocol and Elin had named it.
They set themselves a challenge: get one real show using a single verified record in ten days. They did it. The show dropped out a week later. They read it as a Tuesday.
Elin worked the unglamorous way — messaging show organisers one by one. No network, no warm intros. Just persistence. Someone finally said yes. His name was Henrik Voss.
Voss didn't reply with a brush-off — he replied with an invitation. They stood before him with a half-formed idea and undeniable hunger, and he saw guts. That was the moment the journey began.
Henrik Voss at the yard where he first tested the protocol.
The mentors
Where one opens doors and points the way, the other teaches the team how to walk through them and keep walking.
The guide who saw it first
Former FEI steward · First believer
He didn't answer a cold message with a polite no — he answered with 'send me the protocol.' He'd seen a thousand polished pitches; what he saw here was guts. He gave Horsey its first real test: a regional show willing to write every score to one record.
The guide who brought the world
20+ years · Bloodstock agency · International sales
A career that reads like three stacked into one. She has sold horses across four continents and watched deals collapse over missing paperwork. She brings the rarest commodity a young startup can receive: experience that has already seen the storms ahead.
The constellation
Two stars at the centre, two mentors beside them — the steady hands that help two young builders aim higher than they could alone.
Founder · The Architect
Builds in the quiet. The strategist and engine behind the protocol.
Founder · The Face
Carries it into the light. The voice, the hustle, the human energy.
Mentor · The Guide
Saw their fire and gave Horsey its first real test in the ring.
Mentor · The Gravity
Brought two decades of building things that scale and endure.
The vision
The idea was always simple. The company that grew around it is anything but — a story of refusal and resilience, of people who were told the sport didn't need better software, and the mentors who recognised something worth building.